


Where There is Sand

by Nolfalvrel



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Blood and Violence, Bottom Connor, But he is going to fall hard for Connor, Canon-Typical Violence, Connor & CyberLife Tower Connor | RK800-60 are Twins, Connor & Upgraded Connor | RK900 are Siblings, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/F, Good Parent Hank Anderson, Hank is going to get PISSED, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Torture, Jericho Crew (Detroit: Become Human) as Family, Kidnapping, M/M, Markus is going to make some tough choices as leader, Post-Apocalypse, Protective Hank Anderson, Think madmax and fallout and fantasy, Top Markus (Detroit: Become Human), Trans Connor (Detroit: Become Human), non-con is NOT between markus and connor
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-09-30
Packaged: 2020-05-13 07:04:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19246222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nolfalvrel/pseuds/Nolfalvrel
Summary: When JERICHO is hit by a group of vicious raiders, Markus makes the mistake of taking something precious from Hank Anderson in revenge.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Please heed the tags! I will update as necessary, but there will be major blood, violence, and torture references within this post apocalyptic world.
> 
> This realm is a mixture of Mad Max and Fall Out type fantasy apocalypse, but there will be magical elements thrown in! This is also years after civilization, so no one remembers 'the good ol' days' or anything.

It is as the sun blisters his bare back, mouth thick and vile with the taste of metal, fingers scorching in the sand as he combats his exhausted legs with a furious snarl, willing himself to get back up onto his feet, that Hank meets Connor.

Kneeling in front of the tent, he sees the pale, grimy face splattered with blood and ash and freckles hiding beneath a collapsed table. The child is small. Brown hair rolled in sticky tufts. Pupils, ringed by umber, swollen with fear. Shock. 

And fierce determination.

Hank doesn’t think the kid reminds him of Cole. But somehow, his son’s face swims up from memory and stutters his heart, then grips and squeezes for an agonized second.

There is screaming all around them but Hank can’t hear it. He just knows it is there. Hoofbeats too, muffled on the grains. Maybe some laughter, tainted with mania. Actually he’s sure there is. Steel whistling, unsheathed and then resheathed in giving flesh. The crackle of fire too, one of his burns reminds him.

He can’t hear any of it. He feels sweat leak over his nose. His legs continue to tell him ‘no’ as he stumbles after reaching halfway to standing. He thinks that is the furthest he is capable of making it in this state. The child almost seems start forward to help him, but thinks better of it.

Hank feels blood pounding in his temples like the thunder of drums. _He can’t hear it._

Behind Hank, the air shifts.

Then sound comes back in raucous suddenness.

“GET UP!” The child screeches.

As though they needed someone else to tell them, his calves and thighs whip themselves into coordination, and he howls as he twists around to grip the club that swings towards him. His attacker does not slow, pushing forward with strength that almost has Hank falling again. But he’s on his feet now, and there’s no stopping the fury that rushes power through him. 

The sand is red around them. There is death giving it’s orchestra as the raiders sweep over the broken tents of the nomads. Hank brings knee into the soft under belly of the other man, unprotected. Big beserkers like this one rarely wore more than loin clothes and pauldrons. The reason is clear as the man, unaffected, exerts more force, bringing the spikes of the weapon closer to Hank’s collapsing arms, bearing down on him. Hank brings his knee in again. 

And again, and the man finally jerks, giving Hank the leverage he needs . He shoves the beserkers’ arms leftward then brings a fist in from the right, cracking jaw. Hank ducks the swing that comes and tackles him to the earth. They roll, and the club is loose and Hank is on top of the other in an instant. His fist doesn’t stop coming down until he starts having to use force to wrest it from the pulpy mess of the man’s face. 

Sucking in air, Hank jerks his head roughly, trying to sweep his wet hair from his vision. Everything is orange hued. That might just be the fire, or the blood loss, or the heat, or a combination of the three. But he doesn’t have time to consider it as he hears the screaming calls of the raiders, watches a group of them whip their stallions into a frenzy some distance away. 

They’re getting ready for a charge.

Wheezing, Hank jolts to his feet, sliding to the table, arms easily scooping the child into his arms without protest. Then he’s running, kid tucked over his shoulder with his left arm, other arm pumping madly as he sprints. He needs to find an axe. 

Or a whip. 

Or another weapon that isn't as unwieldy as that stupid hunk of spiked wood they’d left behind. He vaults over slashed carpets. Somehow there are still others living, and they run in all the wrong directions, frantic. Some bolt towards the _clop-clop, clop-clop, clop-clop_ behind him. There’s more screaming. 

Fucking ratshit ass bastards. He should have killed _all of them_.

There’s calling in their slimy, vicious tongue. Hunting chants, he recognizes, before he’s floored by the dart through his lateral. He keeps the kid in his arms covered as best he can as they go down. 

“Henryyyyy,” A painted face hisses happily as the rider comes to prance around his catch, blowpipe in hand.”Henry, such a pleasant surprise to find you here! I’m so glad to have caught up with you. I still owe you something for my men you murdered in Bolias.”

Hank props himself onto an elbow, the child sheltered beneath his chest, bringing a hand up to flip the rider off. “So do I shithead. Get down from there so I can shove it up your ass.” 

Laughing, the rider leads his mare around them. “Always so charming, Lieutenant.” The skull painted on him is blue and green and gold beneath his beard, but his black eyes are colourless beads that bore into Hank over his grin. His eyes shift down. “What is it that you have there? It looks pretty! Is that your pet?”

“Fuck off,” Hank barks. He hoists the child over his hip and behind him as he sits up. He feels like he’s seeing everything on an angle, and it hurts to breath. But he doesn’t break gaze with the rider.

Odd, clicking chuckles come again. “You always have a way of finding the best treasures. Let’s have a look, shall we?”

The man dismounts, aiming his pipe so that the serrated edge tied to the barrel points to Hank. He keeps it just out of reach. He’s scrawny and weak compared to Hank, long limbed and thin, but clever. 

Two more riders, larger men, have joined them by now, slipping down to flank them. They grab Hank in a rush as he lunges at their leader, who has drawn closer to kick him back and snatch the youth from him. “Bastard!”

The man makes a series of tuts, chastising. “It’s Abram**, actually.” He pulls the now struggling small figure towards him. His hand restrains two small wrists easily. “Come here precious, let me see you.” Abram takes a chunk of hair and yanks. The kid’s chin whips up at the force, neck bared. His greedy little eyes rove everywhere, and his hand leaves the hair to lift the dirty shift—

“You sick perverted son-of-bitch!” Hank pulls the men with him as he lurches forward unsuccessfully.

“I thought as much,”Abram sings as the child shrieks and tries to pull away. “We have ourselves a young _lady_. What’s your name, sweetheart?” After a moment of tense silence Abram gives the child a rough shake, begging no argument.

“C-Connor!” Comes his stuttering reward. Abram smiles a vile saccharine smile.

“Connor! The man cups Connor’s cheek, ochre tipped fingers leaving a black brand. “Your people always have such interesting names.” His eyes come back to Hank, and his head gives a jerk in order. 

The blow is expected. It doesn’t hurt any less as the men begin to bludgeon Hank, firm boots connecting and pulverizing skin. One catches a rib and he feels it crunch and snap and he was wrong before, thinking it was hard to breathe, _this_ is hard to breathe. 

He tries to shelter his head. 

A heel comes down on his left hand. A finger breaks. He only has a moment to feel it before it’s all one ravenous sense of pain again, eating up his body like a fever.

They get bored of beating him quickly, Hank being so quiet through it, and he is brought up by his ponytail to kneel again. He can barely see Connor and Abram now, an eye swelling closed, the other blinking back blood. 

Connor had been shouting a mantra of “Stop!” Now, Connor is just squirming as Abram drags them both forward to Hank.

“You know, I was thinking I was gonna’ have to find a way to make you worth my while for what you did. You know I heard you didn’t even collect the bounty? Real fucking sick, Henry,” Abram drawls, loud. His tone grows angry. “Why even kill them if it ain’t for the money? Is that how you bust one? What, chu’ go around ripping them up and then sticking your dick in their corpses?”

Hank has about a million responses. That he doesn’t stick his junk in another man’s whores. That the weasels had been such cowardly little wetbags that they would have gladly bent over to keep him from feeding them to steel. That they would have begged for it, like Abram is going to. His tongue is too large and heavy to wrap around even one syllable to the words. It’s a pity. 

“When I found you, I vowed I was gonna’ make you pay, _Lieutenant_ ,” The man spits the title like a curse, and secretly Hank might be prone to agree with him. “But consider yourself fucking blessed that slavers don’t stay more than a fortnight in Knox, and now I got shit to sell.” The raider jiggles Connor in gesture. He looks to his men. “Open him up.”

At the order, there is a hiss as a blade is drawn, and Connor’s eyes grow enormous as Hank tenses. He sees what is tantamount to a cleaver in the hands of a third raider, coming from the left, and the hand in his hair becomes a fist that pushes his neck forward as his arms are wrenched back. Readying him for the cut. 

Everything happens so quickly then.

Hank knows he needs to push again. There is no ‘limit’ right now. Life or death. Kill or be killed. Move, or stay unmoving, forever. And he’s prepared to do it. No need for Connor to tell him this time. Every part of him coils with adrenaline, ready to snap and release. He slackens his left arm, letting it grow comfortably limp in his restrainers palms, planning to pull the other man into the path of the weapon when it drops towards him.

But Hank doesn’t get the chance, because the sand is shifting behind Abram as he stalks away, back to his horse. Unaware of the danger that slithers beneath the granules, jerking Connor along with him like a disobedient dog, and then the earth is erupting and sand is spraying and the men shout and then shriek as Abram stumbles and a shape rips upward and thereisamotherfuckingwyverndragon—

Glossy blue, reflecting a million brilliant suns off every scale, the creature is an arch of beryl so vivid it makes the sky seem grey and dull. It’s wings spread long, eight, ten, no twenty men across. It’s back is a ridge of vicious mountains. The tail unfurls and lashes with fury as it roars, eyes roving, towering over Abram. 

Everyone is frozen. Hank is sure he can smell piss on the man that fell in fear next to him. 

Then it’s wings finally beat again and with this roar comes a spew of flames. And Abram is screaming.

Hank whirls on his captors, now only two as the other one bolts. He needs to deal with them quickly to get to Connor. 

A kick brings the urine soaked raider down, and Hank maneuvers under the cleaver to bring his jaws around the throat of the other. He tears away and spits globs of human, then wrestles the weapon from the limp grip to end the life of the kicked man scrambling back to his feet.

The blade turns easily in Hank’s hands as he whirls to face the beast, eyes scouring the scene for Connor, before the noxious stench hits him, and he actually processes what he is seeing. 

The wyvern plays with shrivelled limbs. It’s mouth closes and yanks on what could be a head. It’s hard to tell with everything so blackened and formless, as though all the flesh has melted and pooled together. Hank realizes why Abram had been so piercingly loud. He realizes that’s Abram.

Not even a foot away, crouched near the thing’s tail, is Connor. The child is watching intently, as though not sure the raider is really dead. Like any moment the fleshy coal lump might sprout new limbs, good as new. Like that’s what is important to be wary of. The child doesn’t seem the least bit frightened by the wyvern. Hank is baffled.

Exhaustion and confusion dance nausea through his stomach. Hank collapses and vomits, and what he vomits is mostly vermillion sludge. Shit. There’s a patter of feet. Then his hair is being held back as he heaves.

“Are you going to be alright?” Connor asks.

“Do I fucking look like I’ll be?” Hank rasps. He can’t help but growl when his insides are desperately trying to become his outsides and there’s a fucking enormous creature playing with his enemy like a kitten does yarn. 

Connor’s eyes flash with concern as Hank’s gagging grows more violent. “Amanda!” The child cries, and the wyvern turns and _looks right at them._

Hank can’t do any more. He can’t. He _can’t_. But he lifts a shaky hand in front of Connor anyway as the beast draws near. 

Blood loss must really be doing a number on him, or maybe Hank’s actually dead and all this is a fantasy the Devil’s constructing for his own special Hell. The wyvern paces towards them and as it does, it ripples, the scales peel back in smooth waves that become drapes of cloth over smooth brown skin, a rich robe imbued with all the ranges of sapphire. From the creature’s form steps a woman, slight and regal and human. 

Woozy, Hank’s arm gives beneath him, and he topples into the ground next to his sick. Connor exclaims. The air feels heavy. Every part of his body feels like it belongs to somebody else. From this angle, he faces the sky, not as blue as the woman or the wyvern, but welcoming all the same.

He thinks if he closes his eyes now, he might see Cole. 

The woman rushes to his side, as Connor pushes matted strands from Hank’s forehead. “Please, you have to help him.”

“Let me see him.” Cool fingers rove his face, cheeks, pull hair away from the split on his temple, following damage down his chest and legs. Hank can tell she is trying to be gentle. The dragon that just roasted a man alive and became a woman is trying to be delicate with him. He can’t help but chortle at that. Red sputum comes up with each exhale. “Don’t move! Your condition is serious.”

“You—were—a—dragon,” Each word is punctuated by a cough. Hank places the pieces together finally, with what shattered brains he has left. He looks at her with understanding. “A dragon… you’re—you’re a Changeling.”

“Hold still,” The Changeling commands impatiently. “You’re just making things more painful for yourself at this point.”

If only she could know how true that rings. How much he enjoys that. How he is very nearly excited right now, that it may finally happen. That he could finally close his eyes and gasp a few more rounds of life before sinking into an oblivious nothingness. 

Nonetheless, Hank acquiesces, though he can’t stop how harshly his lungs shake his chest. But then Amanda’s palm runs across him again, and where the fiercest pain pools there is cool relief, like a draught of cold water to a parched tongue, and he arches his neck down in amazement. Watching as the Changeling heals him, her arm traced with alien glowing symbols that twist a web down her fingers. Gliding over bruises and scouring them away. She doesn’t chant anything but her brow furrows intensely. 

In a mix of fear and awe, Hank’s fist twitches, and he feels something squish. Connor has slipped a tiny hand into his own, while the other works over his cracked knuckles with soothing pets. Connor’s eyes are focussed on Amanda. 

When her strange magic fixes the dart hole in his leg, Hank brings himself slowly to sitting, feeling the glossy new skin across his chest and thighs, his unbroken fingers. His clothing bears the only reminders of injuries, rips browned and sticky. He turns to Amanda, swallowing. “Why did…?”

“Connor seems to have a fondness for you, fallen soldier. There is no reason more than that to have healed you,” Amanda dismisses. Before them, Amanda warps again, turning into a cat, a lovely black underpinned by that same perfect blue. “You should be so grateful, that the child asked that of me with the last of my energy. Be diligent, human, there are no more second chances now.” Her back is impossibly austere, eyes a broiling magma of condensed sun that makes Hank want to look away. 

He forces himself not to. “Who are you?” 

“You already know what I am. You said it yourself.” A Changeling. A creature of the arcane, with a hundred thousand legends to its name. They fed off moonlight, and when the moon waned fully, flesh. They stole into camps and stole the shadows of men, causing them to forget everything about themselves. They had a bag full of faces that they changed as the weather, causing mischief and misery. They were hidden and powerful and subject only to rumour, but the endings to the stories seemed true. Most men who met such beings were killed by them, not saved. Hank shakes his head.

“That shit doesn’t explain who you are.”

Quiet stretches, and Amanda seems prone to leave it that way. Then Connor speaks.

“She’s my Handler,” Connor says, going to stand. A rivulet of blood tracks the kid’s cheek. 

Hank realizes he is still holding Connor’s hand as he uses it as an anchor, keeping the kid in place. He frees it then so he can cradle Connor’s face, turning it up so he can see the wound clumping at the kid’s temple.

“Fuck that looks nasty,” Hank gripes, glaring to the Changeling. “You fixed me before taking a look at this?” 

It’s ferocious and rude and _so incredibly dangerous_ to accuse a Changeling of neglect mere seconds after she has saved his life. But Hank loathes that Connor had been left to endure while he had been laying about so pathetically. Hank is an adult— his injuries are his mistakes. He can handle pain. Connor is only a child. 

Amanda bristles, but Hank is already ripping at his remaining shirt pieces to dab at the wound, interrogating Connor. “What do you mean by Handler?”

“She’s my teacher,” Connor elaborates not so elaboratively, wincing and pushing at Hank as he dabs. “Can you stop,” The man doesn’t stop. Connor ducks under his hands, trying to get away before Hank grabs and pulls the kid back in front of him.“Stop, please! I need to—”

“You need to get this cleaned, otherwise it will get infected,” He growls at the child, gripping cheeks between a thumb and forefinger. “Teacher for what?”

“Magic!” Connor whines.

“Magic? How can you know magic, you’re just a kid!” Hank scoffs.

“I’m a Witch,” Connor returns defiantly. “Let me go, please, I need to find my brothers!”

Ice through his veins at the word makes Hank freeze. “A Witch?” Connor gives him a miserable look, fed up. 

“Amanda!” 

“Soldier,” Hank’s lap is invaded by the sleek animal, a paw poised on his chest, her same million sun eyes ripping into his soul. “I can tell you mean well, but the child is scared. He’s been separated from his family. The raider’s leader may be dead, but they’re not finished their run. Please, help him find his brothers.”

Caws make their way to Hank’s ears, the cracks of guns and fire, and he realizes that she’s right. They may have put down first in command, but second is surely waiting in the wings. 

Letting go of Connor causes the child to stumble, and all Hank can feel is tired as each of them watch the other. Evaluating.

“You’re not just a little girl…,” Hank breathes finally, after they’ve wasted precious seconds. 

“I’m not a _girl_ , I’m a Witch,” Connor’s chin raises, a pinch haughty. Face still crummy with soot; ochre; blood. Something in the tone might be implying that Hank is a bit stupid for not getting it.

“You know, it probably would have helped your brothers a lot more if you’d used some of that magic on the raiders, Witch,” Hank points out, unthinking, worn down by the fighting and running and now arguing with a child. 

When Connor’s eyes brim with tears, Hank realizes he was only projecting the disdain, and he curses. “Fuck! Shit, no, don’t fucking cry!”

“Y-y-you’re r-right, th-th-th-they w-w-were killed ‘caus-se, of me,” Connor wails, no where near loud enough to draw attention, but definitely enough to grab hold of the guilt in Hank and twist, wrenching his stomach into a ball. “I-I-I s-sho-should h-h-hav—“

Amanda sits silently, watching.

“Ah Jesus, no, shut up, don’t say that, don’t!” Hank knows he’s really the one that should be shutting up, keeping his ugly fat mug to himself, and leave Connor lie; let the kid sob out all the misery of seeing people slaughtered like livestock; imagining that it could be happening to missing brothers; but he can’t because he just wants to stop those sounds and that clear salty liquid cleaning streams over Connor’s face. He gathers Connor into his arms, instinct driving him.

Hank hugs Connor. “Don’t fucking listen to me, what do I know. Listen, just stop, stop crying alright? I’ll help you look for them Connor. We’re going to look for them, okay?”

Connor is so light it’s like hugging bones. The kid doesn’t stop shaking for minutes after, every wretched emotion pouring out of him, into Hank’s filthy, tattered shirt. 

When the cries pewter out, and Connor seems drained, Hank curls around the child and stands. Tucking Connor onto a hip, he scowls over the blistered dunes, the wrecked remains of people still in the lack of wind. 

The sun sears into them, and Hank paces to a corpse, wrenching a scarf free. Looping it over Connor, conscious of pale skin probably already set to burn, Hank picks up the cleaver next. Less maneuverable than he’d like, but it is big and sharp. There’s a dig of claws into his pants, and suddenly Amanda is atop his shoulder. She surveys the land with him, balancing easily. 

“Can’t you become something useful, like a sanzard?”

Amanda looks at him. “As I said, my magic is spent. I used a lot of energy getting here, and then saving you both. This is the easiest way you can transport me.”

“Do I fucking look like a mount to you?” Hank complains. 

“You look like a man, so yes,” Amanda replies calmly. Hank can’t help but chuckle at her blatant seriousness. He likes a woman that can hold her sass.

“Well alright then,” He heaves a breath, letting the weapon drag in the sand. “Let’s go find your brothers, Connor.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There be it! I finally finished summer semester so now I have time to write again, and I still want to work on my two other DBH projects but I couldn't get this idea out of my head, so it's not as refined as other writings that I spend hours going over. So have a Post Apocalyptic Romeo and Julietish type story.
> 
> Hank has a mysterious probably not going to be fully fleshed out but highly referenced to dark past. He is no longer a Lieutenant, but there are some people that recognize him by that.
> 
> Amanda does care for Connor, but she is also interested in Hank, which is why she didn't rip into him for distressing Connor. She will not end up in a relationship with him though, sorry! They will just become good friends that understand what it's like to deal with loss.
> 
> **Abram btw is the same guy that shoves Markus when he goes to get paints for Carl in DBH
> 
> Please leave a comment! <3


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ****CONTENT WARNINGS****PLEASE READ****
> 
> There are allusions/references to NONCON and assault during a brutal raid (not being done to Markus or Connor), as well as graphic depictions of violence and torture (again not being inflicted upon Markus or Connor). Please proceed with caution!
> 
> There is also a time skip for this chapter from the previous one. This story is intended to mostly revolve around the perspectives of Markus, Connor and Hank but there will be some perspective shifting for certain scenarios.

_**Eleven Years Later…** _

The scream works its way up through her throat, but Kara catches it with her teeth, gritted in a terrified sneer as she tucks Alice against her. Her arms try desperately to swallow the little girl, suffocating Alice to her chest as they cram between the haystacks. She watches through the gap rimmed by straw, praying the dark is enough to hide them, knowing hopelessly it is not. In her mind she begs Alice not to startle if someone enters the room. Out loud she fights to keep her breathing quiet. Anything could draw attention.

Outside is alight with shrieks and fire. Raids always employ the same methods—a hedonistic, bloody ritual. First the scourge of flames. A raise of yellow and red had quickly buckled the metal of the hull, creating a horrific, hot pyre. Next, the cracks of gunfire, preciously reserved for those relentless individuals who would be heroes, were they not shredded immediately.

Before, when the two of them had lived outside of Jericho, scampering from nomad huts to transient camps, raids were much more frequent. Kara had become an expert at avoiding capture, travelling light, sleeping lighter; Alice always within reach to pick up and run. JERICHO has made her lazy and soft. 

When the bells had sounded, Kara had frozen, stuck on the fact that Alice was now too big to carry. Then Alice had grabbed ahold of her fingers, telling her to run.

The fine china that Simon had gathered meticulously laid in a carpet of pieces as Kara heaved Alice over the cabinets. The books burned in the library as they had raced through it; years of scarce history, desperately coveted, reduced to ash, sure to devastate Josh. 

She’s certain the garden is in a similar ruin, blackened to embers. All the marvelous paintings everywhere smashed and torn. Of course everything will be unsalvageable. But those were just things. She won’t care if it means all the people could be fine. 

Jerry and his brothers. Nikolaos**. Rupert. _Ralph_. 

She wants to sob. Fragile, nervous wreck Ralph, his slashed face grim with an awareness no one thought he was capable of anymore as the alarms screamed. So incredibly frightened, hearing the shouting from the balconies above. Shot after shot flashing at the intruders as they lunged onto the rungs, climbing to disarm JERICHO’s snipers, each raider fallen birthing two more equally rabid, determined men. 

Ralph had stood between them and the sounds resolutely. Telling her to follow Alice.

Kara isn’t weak. But Alice is worth more to her than anything. So she’d grasped those tiny fingers fiercely and bolted, like a coward.

Her lungs haven’t stopped pumping fear, so she lays a palm over her own mouth, shuddering when there is the sick suction of a knife shredding a body, over and over, then a thud, from the hall outside. There hadn’t been time to close the door. Light spills as a blinding white crack, a slit of damnation, into the room. It flickers as black shapes move past. A horrific shadow puppet show. She’s glad she can’t make out most of them. 

JERICHO is a maze. Only the founders of JERICHO might know the way around all of the ship. The thought keeps Kara optimistic that they will be lost in the mere immensity of JERICHO’s spaces, the multitudes of storage areas and sealed off rooms. Like the one they’re hiding in, where they keep supplies for livestock. 

The tanker had been a prisoner transport centuries ago, before some foreign force caused it to run aground and tear apart and then fossilize within the desert. So, there are many rooms for the many people that Markus has chosen to bring under his wing. 

The leader had laughed, eyes bright, at her reaction to being told that each chamber was actually a holding cell originally.

“Don’t be alarmed.” He’d smiled easily. Kara’s soul yearned to listen to that soothing, calming voice, even back then, though logic had railed at her to be tense and distrusting, always. Men were exceptional liars when they believed what they were selling. “It may have been built with that purpose in the beginning, but that’s not how we run things in JERICHO. If you choose to stay a guest now, you can still leave any time you would like later. Most don’t though, so I try to share the irony. Sometimes peace is its own pleasant trap.” 

Markus had taken most of their fighters for the supply run. Food came easily to their home, what with the river buried deep below them in the catacombs, and the rich soil of the greenhouse keen to grow any seed. 

Medicine, parts and even weapons were far more difficult to harvest. Far more precious. And transporting such materials was incredibly dangerous, bandits rampant and creatures of the desert ravenous. So whenever Markus journeyed, over a dozen people accompanied to carry and to protect the cargo. 

Of course, Markus hadn’t been stupid. He’d left them defenses; his right hand, North; Ripple and Echo, her ferocious vanguard; Nikolaos and all his daemons. Their auxiliary remained behind as well, fourteen well trained, reputable, experienced soldiers. But the men come to reckon were hounds. Beasts of men, and yet also somehow whispers. They’d snuck inside too quickly and then multiplied. 

And now Jericho is burning, and a prison.

_No one will find them. No one will find them. They’ll be safe, because no one will find them._

Is she reassuring herself? Praying? Begging?

Alice’s tiny hand squeezes her own as the loud wail of a child passes by.

As if her pessimism is calling for it, begging to be proven right, a shuffle of footsteps pauses outside the door, and unlike all the others, does not move on. Instead, Kara squeezes her eyes tightly as a sick chill washes over her, and the feet enter the room. The loud step indicates a heavy man. A _shuffle_ -and- _thunk_ combo indicates a lurching gait, someone limping. The raspy breath indicates either exhaustion or excitement. 

Probably both.

She doesn’t know what it is drawing him into the room. There is nothing shiny to plunder here. They cannot be seen from the outside. 

It must be experience. He knows to check and see if someone has squirrelled themselves away. 

Alice is a drawn wire against her, taut, chest barely moving. Cold, like Kara’s blood, though Kara’s hands are like hot brands against their skin. She lifts the one from her mouth and slides it, quick but quiet, down her leg, to the blade clipped at her thigh. Her fingers hook into the eye of the pommel, ready to draw. 

Chuffs of breath come from the intruder, slightly wet. Closer, then further away, thumping about the other side, and Kara has to make a decision between staying hidden and being cornered, or making a run for the door.

Her hand holding the blade snaps to Alice’s collar instead, gripping it and hauling the girl into the open. “RUN!” 

Alice stumbles and squeals, but her feet get under her quickly, and she’s bolting through the door, another shadow across the entryway. She’s always been fast. Gotten faster, since having a full belly and warm bed. She’s disappeared by the time Kara’s boots touch the light, thankfully. She hears the raider shout, too close, “BITCH!”

Kara flings herself from the path of a crate as it smashes past her, stumbling and turning to face the lumbering man. His meaty palm comes on the door, slamming it closed. His body is big under a thick black coat, and his breath echoes beneath his plastic animal mask. 

A Saint Bernard dog, large and round and smiling. Like the mascots from an amusement park. Like _Pirate’s Cove_ where she’d squatted years ago. Many of the raiders wore the same one, bearings of their group. Kara is unfamiliar with the symbol. She doubts being able to place it to a family name would help her now anyway, but she can’t help but wonder why they would choose to inhibit themselves with such a costume.

“C’mere bitch, let’s have a smell of that pretty neck,” The dog-mask chuckles. He steps forward and Kara steps back, fingers squeezing around her machete. She angles her right hip away. 

“Please, let me go,” Kara begs, her tone wobbly. “Please, please, don’t kill me. Please, I have a daughter!”

They engage in the same two step dance of victim and predator, Kara circling warily. He doesn’t seem to have his own weapon, or he hasn’t deemed it necessary to bring out. He might be the sick kind that prefers to use his hands, the same way some prefer knives over guns. 

Revolting but potentially fortunate. She can do something with an unarmed giant. 

He clicks his tongue. “Ah, ah, don’t make things difficult sweetheart. You don’t want your screams to bring back your little girl, do you?"

“Please,” Kara whimpers, backing into a corner, fitting neatly between pipes and wires. Watching the raider trek closer, his breaths coming faster from excitement. She must look so sad and pathetic. A rabbit curled and writhing away from a wolf. Her heart is nearly in her throat, trying to climb out, ferociously wanting to reconnect with Alice. Every thump is an ask if the girl will be alright by herself, a reminder that she’s all alone out there, with men like this. 

One thick glove comes to rest above her head as the raider rushes into her space hungrily. Confidently. After all, she’s already started begging for her life. The sign of the loser. The weak. The other glove buries in her short black hair, squeezing harshly, and his groin bucks forward in a grind, and with a shift, he is completely vulnerable. 

When his hips pull back, Kara loops her ring finger through her machete’s eye and whips it deftly into a circle before them. The blade whistles. Sings death. And the man gurgles worse than ever.

Choking, he sputters, and those meaty fingers come to grip his now smiling neck. Blood sprays. It spatters her face, their clothes, his plastic grinning mask. She presses the sole of her boot into the wall behind her and uses the leverage to shove him away. He crumbles, cracks his head against a barrel, and continues to shudder against the ground. Kara leaps over him swiftly, running to the door. She pulls on the tumbler and yanks it open, fear making her reckless. She should be waiting and listening for his friends. But Alice has already been gone too long. 

The hallway is eerily empty, but the sounds of terror echo about as soft susurrations. She keeps low. Her head swivels around, spying for an attack. The machete stays out, dripping.

When she rounds the next corner, she sees Alice being lifted by an even larger man than the one before.

The machete whips and buries into the wall behind him as Kara races forward, drawing her pistol, screaming, “Don’t touch h—Luther!”

“Kara!” The enormous man is surprised, his head having jerked aside sharply to avoid her blade. Kara has stalled, but then she rushes forward, emotion evolving from terror to joy. 

Alice tries vainly to close her arms around Luther’s massive chest as he kneels to her height. Her pale face is bright against his dark skin, carried easily against him with one arm. Kara joins their hug eagerly. 

Luther’s voice comes, quiet but panicked. “Kara, you’re bleeding!”

“Kara!” Alice chimes in. Her eyes are huge and round.

“It’s-it’s—it’s not my blood,” Kara stutters, feeling Luther’s spare arm shift and crush her to him. She buries her face into his shoulder, hiding shiny eyes. “You’re back. You’re safe.” She hears only silence in response.

“…That’s my line,” Luther eventually murmurs uneasily, stroking her hair. “Come on, we have to go.” He shifts, making to stand, and though Kara knows he could carry both of them without complaint, she draws back. She keeps her face down, wiping at the spillover from her eyes, gun hand clenched. She doesn’t know why, but suddenly she doesn’t want him to see her cry. He’ll feel guilty then. 

It’s not Luther’s job to protect them, but since day one of meeting him at JERICHO, he has punished himself if he doesn’t. She can’t imagine what he must be thinking right now, with their stricken faces; the noise and the blood. That he’d chosen to leave them and be by Markus’ side instead. His face is deep, brown stone, impassive as he hooks Alice over a hip. The girl’s eyes orientate to Kara. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine, Alice. Really. It’s not my blood.” Kara gives an echo of a reassuring smile. Alice doesn’t say anything, but she is clearly still troubled, turning into Luther’s shoulder.

Scrambling up the wall, Kara jumps and pulls her knife free, following Luther when he gestures. They step hurriedly through the hallways and catwalks, Luther leading but Kara darting ahead to check the coast is clear when rounding corners and new paths. She tries to stifle the elation of both seeing him alive and knowing Alice had been okay during that blink of time. They could easily still end up being victims in this purge.

The journey grows long despite how fast they’re moving, and tension mounts in her shoulders, and any sense of invincibility fades into trepidation. Things have grown quiet, but not silent. There are still people fighting, it’s hot and sticky, evidence that the fire is swelling. She checks her six over and over, whipping her head back to Luther and Alice just as quickly, worried they might have disappeared in that millisecond. They climb several stairs, footfalls entirely too loud.

The smoke is less on this level of the ship. Luther walks ahead, Alice in one arm, his large leather coat uncannily similar to the raider Kara had killed. She looks at the floor, nauseous. She wants to ask so many questions. Luther had left before with Markus’ troop. If he’s here, they had obviously all returned to witness the slaughter of their people. Had all who left made it back with Markus? What had their leader said when he realized what was happening? What had he looked like?

It would be fury that painted Markus, surely, which scares Kara slightly. A rich, warm smile, the kind that melted frowns, is the only face Kara has really known Markus to wear. But from stories hinted by gabbing members of JERICHO, she knows he can get angry. And if truly, wholly, incredibly pushed, violent. 

When they come to a ladder, Kara finally recognizes through the murk where they are. One of scout entrances. Thus similarly, an exit. They climb, Kara first, then Alice, then Luther. 

The light of day is blinding, and Kara has to swallow the shock at the face that pulls her through the shutter. But she can’t help the ‘Ralph!’ that escapes.

Blond hair matted, wicked scar worsened under blackening blood, Ralph grins as he helps her to her feet. “H-hel-hello Kara.”

“Ralph!” Alice is far more blatant about her joy, face transforming at the sight of him. If possible, his expression grows fonder as he is tackled to the earth. 

“Little girl!”

All around the exit, a plank slanting from Jericho’s hull, is bright sand. Kara squints, scouring the area for other familiar faces or bodies, but other than Ralph they are alone. 

“There are more people at the other bolt-ways,” Luther’s hand lands on her shoulder, turning her to him. “Markus sent each of us in to find people and get as many of them out as possible. Ralph was one of the last stragglers I found. He decided to wait here once I told him I was going back in for you.”

“What do you mean by getting people out? Out as in escape? Abandon JERICHO?”

Luther seems uncomfortable with the suggestion. “Markus asked me to direct everyone to the Church. He’s going to try to retake Jericho, but he can’t guarantee success.” 

Steel runs through Kara’s expression at that, and she nods in understanding. “Okay. Okay.” She swallows. The Church is a good three day’s trek from here, four if they’re unlucky. And they are, grimy and worn down and unprepared. Alice is fretting over Ralph’s shoulder, which is swollen and gummy already, sure to breed infection. They have no food or water to brave the desert. 

Luther reads her mind again. “We’ll make it, Kara.”

“Of course we will,” She replies seriously, staring fixedly at the wispy dunes that stretch beyond the gangway. “Alice and I have been through worse.”

\------------------

 

North rides ahead with Nikolaos on his great white polar bear, its exposed electric innards glinting under the branding sun. Her hood is drawn fully over her penny bright hair, her swollen face. Markus watches how stiff she is against the necromancer, how undeniably exhausted.

He wipes sweat from his neck and draws his own hood, which smells like ash and copper, further over his head. It creates a shield of shadow, might help him fend off a few more freckles on his deep skin. He tried to sneak in a complaint about it to North last night, get her to speak to him—even if it would be out of annoyance. Her milky complexion burns with so much as a minute in daylight, as she’s often told him.

She hadn’t said a word though.

She hasn’t since JERICHO.

That coils something hot inside Markus, fiercer than even the bake of the desert. He looks behind. Sees Simon, who gives him a tired, encouraging smile as he trudges through the sand. Markus can’t find Josh along the line, though that doesn’t surprise him, but he knows he is there.

They are a group of thirty in the Maobi desert. They navigate the sea of yellow in a worn line, Nikolaos at the front, the sanzards and Markus’ stallion, Siarl, taking up the rear. The sanzards drag the water barrels, sparse filled crates and Jericho’s five remaining children atop two buggies, the thick muscled creatures still struggling with the shift of the sand. 

The dackals, Ruby and Kat, lope up and down the row of people, barking whenever they find someone fatiguing, pulling them back to the lizards to rest. They haven’t sounded off for a while fortunately, though they’re only into the first few hours of the walk today. 

Having rested, Markus begins to slow, calling, “Pack!” His dry tongue stifles the word, and he coughs and swallows and tries to wet his throat with saliva before shouting again. “Pack!”

A hand lands on his shoulder, and he turns, finding a deep brown face turned pointedly away from him, despite the grabbing fingers. Josh. 

The tall man slips from his heavy burden quickly. Markus is surprised when Josh stops and holds the pack out in front of him, still not meeting his eyes. Josh struggles to keep it high, but he is clearly waiting for Markus to loop through the arm holes. Markus rushes to relieve him. When he has a firm grip Josh whips away, heading to the back of the line, not even pausing when Markus calls his name. Simon watches them both, slinging a bag of his own over his shoulder as a woman, Mercy, walks away, hiding behind her black hair. His blue eyes bore into Markus.

“You can’t keep pushing,” Simon admonishes gently, knocking into him. “This is hard for him. What we’ve had to do.”

“It’s hard for _me_ ,” Markus hisses in complaint. “I didn’t want _any of this_.”

“I know. I know you didn’t.”

Ahead, North has become a slouched bundle, most likely sleeping, which would be a small mercy. She hadn’t last night. Seeing her there and thinking of Josh dismissing him just gets that same acidic burn starting again in Markus’ stomach. “Then why the Hell doesn’t he—”

“He’s a pacifist Markus. A religious pacifist. He can’t let himself agree with what we’re doing, even if it is necessary. It would betray who he is. Even if it is for North, or him, or all of us.” Despite the reassurance, Simon’s face is pained, and his wistful gaze wanders behind them. 

Markus reminds himself that he isn’t the only one being ostracized by their friend. Josh can probably point to the exact stains on both of them. The places where they had had to scrub free the blood.

With how dry it is, words are a precious commodity. They grow silent. Anger fuels Markus. He spends his energy pushing closer to Nikolaos and North. Simon gores his back with sympathetic eyes. 

They’re about halfway to the Church, still two days away, when Nikolaos slows and looks to him. Markus takes the cue and raises a fist, signaling to stop and break. He lets the pack drop with a groan. His people congeal together, dusty and tired, away from the sanzards. Eager for water and fast rations of dried pear. Markus watches them, sitting and panting, knowing he should join them and recuperate. He’s too tired to move. His very heart feels like it’s pushing lead instead of blood. 

To avoid overburdening the sanzards and keep a fast pace, heavy packs have been shared among the sturdiest members. Ten packs to fifteen people has been agony, so Markus has deliberately tried to keep longer turns, knowing that he’s stronger than the others. That’s what a good leader does. Faces down adversity, unblinking. Inspiring. Valiant.

Even if Josh doesn’t think so anymore. 

Markus ducks his head between his legs, hiding a frown. He’s trying to at least appear pleasant to everyone, since outright smiling might be inappropriate. He doesn’t know if he’s doing a good job, or fooling only himself. Simon might not tell him right now. It’s too stressful; too tiring; too much, right now.

If Josh wants to blame someone, Markus can’t help but think, furiously, that it should be the men who had gutted Jericho. When they had returned home, they had already been running, spying the black scar of smoke wafting across the sky. But it had been too late. The ship had cracked and splintered under the heat. Their people had been decimated. Their lives dismantled like a bloody jigsaw puzzle.

Markus had faced his men and asked each of them to go in after their brethren. Asked because he couldn’t order them into such a hellish scenario. Entering what was basically a flaming tomb. 

All of them followed him inside.

Every raider Markus had met was put down quickly. He hadn’t wasted time in being vicious or cruel. His priority had been locating his people. 

In all honesty, the thought screaming at him, over and over, had been _‘North, North, North’_. 

And then he’d entered that room and—

Markus swallows, scrubbing over his face.

And then he’d entered that room and seen—

He stands quickly. Ruby whines nearby, picking up on his agitation. His thoughts feel trapped inside his head, like gnats buzzing around carrion. A foul, festering secret that he hides by pretending everything is fine. He needs to keep moving, do something. 

Markus makes his way to Siarl. He’s exhausted still, but any time he tries to rest the dam blows open and all the horror floods back to him in vivid detail. 

Three men; two participating. One watching. 

A voyeur? Lookout? Some tiniest vestige of morality holding him back from a hair thin line? Markus isn’t sure, and nor does he care. Letting it play out made the man one hundred percent as guilty as the others.

North had been screaming, and he could tell by the deep tracks in the raider’s arms, that she had fought like a viper. They had wrestled her onto a counter. Both had removed their masks to reveal filthy faces. Thicker, weathered men under beards. White wrinkles, likes scratches on glass, lined their skin, from grinning. There were gaps in one’s teeth. Though the other had perfect set, pristine, as they bit into North’s calf. Then licked. 

If Markus had had a moment to process, he might have been stunned with how his tomahawk imbedded itself, so viciously perfect, in the man’s mouth. But he’d been snarling and running after it, louder than the new shrieking of the men filling the black, damp room. His other hatchet already poised for release.

Markus spots Daniel before he realizes he’s made his way to him at the back of the line. The man is still, observing and expectant on Siarl’s back. The bridge of his nose and cheeks are red, and his expression is sour, and it’s startling how similar and yet different he appears compared to Simon, his twin. He wears a beaten wool desert hat like a crown, chin arching up with an eyebrow as Markus stops and stands and just stares at his feet.

“Hungry for flies Markus?” Daniel’s tone is dry and snooty, and Markus clamps his mouth promptly shut with a scowl. Markus switches from glaring at the sand at his feet to glaring at the sand in the distance. They bask in silence, which Daniel can only appreciate when he is the one delivering it, so he drawls, “Is there something out there we should be worried about, or are you searching for the right words to start this conversation?”

“What conversation?” Markus retorts stiffly.

Daniel rolls his eyes quickly, leaning forward on Siarl’s neck. “Alright I’ll start it for you. I’ll bring the bastard out a ways from camp tonight, set up a fire and you can castrate the son of a bitch with some burning shears.” Markus’ head snaps round. “What? If he still bleeds out after the cauterization, he’s the deserts problem. You worried a little red in the sand will bring out nasty critters?”

“We are not emasculating our prisoner!” Markus hisses as quietly as possible, darting quick looks at the Jericho survivors and the nearby sleigh to check none of the children are listening. Luckily it appears empty. “Why are you even suggesting something like that?”

“To be honest, half to get your reaction and half because that’s literally all I have left in getting that assbag to talk.” Daniel’s tone is defensive and irritated, and his words make Markus tense.

“That’s the last thing you can think of?”

“It’s been hard to try and get _anything_ out of him while trying to keep things down for everyone else. I can’t get at his teeth if I need to gag him in between questions, and he has no nails left. We’re not feeding or watering him. Piercing any more of the skin than what I have could lead to serious infection or fever.”

A sigh wrests it’s way from Markus’ chest. “We don’t want that. We barely have enough medical supplies for our own people without using it on a raider.”

“Exactly,” Daniel sighs. “And he needs his feet to walk so I can’t cut toes off. And before you start, the cybernetic hands are deactivated for safety—I’m not turning them back on so we can try ripping pieces off and end up strangled. So, all I’ve got left is his dick. You know, since you got the eyes and all that.”

Markus feels that same hot sickness wash over him for the umpteenth time. He asks, “Where is he?”

Daniel jerks his head. “Behind the cart. I sent the kids to Echo, told them to take a break from staring at me and a man who helped make them orphans again.”

A beat passes. “Thank you for that,” Markus says softly, genuinely. “Although I hope you didn’t phrase it that way.”

“Of course not. I would never say something that cruel with Em—never mind,” Daniel is petulant again, but it’s soft and tired like Markus’ tone. He swings a leg over, dismounting and grunting. “Let’s go make sure that fucker isn’t sleeping.”

Their prisoner is indeed sleeping in the shade of the sanzards. Coiled between the huge leg of a beast and the enormous rubber wheels of their cart, the man cannot be likened to something as ridiculous as ‘small’ or ‘innocent’. He is diminished however, and pathetic, a slovenly curl of bruised man under cracked armour. His face is nearly as ruddy as his beard. 

A sharp kick to his gut from Daniel has him roused and reckless, spinning, useless tied arms flopping as he tries to stand, shrieking. Daniel steps back easily and aims a fierce jab to the man’s throat, choking him. He collapses back to his knees, twisting and gagging on air. “Hey, bow for our grand leader. He’s decided to visit you again. He wanted to make sure the accommodations are to your liking.” Daniel’s tone is dry, impassive. His sarcasm always toes the line of seriousness. 

“Quinton,” Markus addresses their prisoner. Quinton regains control of his throat and gasps. One eye can barely open as he turns to Markus. Both are bloodshot. Beset by burns, it gives the slight appearance of the hollow eyes within a skull.

Quinton spits at Markus’ feet. “An offering,” he shakes out with a grin. 

The bravado is weak when Markus has seen the man begging for his life. Daniel arches a brow.

“Seems like a bit of a waste considering you’re not getting water till Markus feels you deserve it,” Daniel comments. “What do you think Markus?” Daniel pauses to read Markus’ face, stiff as though cut from stone. “Well guess that’s a ‘no’ for a few years. Tough luck.” 

Quinton scoffs and shrugs indifferently. Indifferent in the same way he had watched those men with North. Markus wonders how much he can see now, after Markus’ fingernails and the fire glove he’d forced into his face, and feels a terror at himself when he thinks how any sight is still too much. Markus steps forward a little shakily, thrumming with strange energy, feeling like he’s been turned just one more notch towards unhinged. 

“I don’t have new questions for you,” Markus starts, getting close enough to breathe the stench of putrid sweat and pus from the raider’s wounds, the vomit that flecks his beard. He crouches and knows Daniel tenses behind him. If Quinton could move his arms, he could strangle Markus easily. “What family do you call to, and why did you choose to attack Jericho?”

“Fuck ye, I already told—”

“You were lying,” Markus hisses. Quinton sneers. 

“Fuck you, ye cocksucking base ass pansy bitch, I already toldja it was that jackcock dog bastard! He paid us te go after yeh!”

“You’re still lying!” Markus accuses, and lunges to his feet, aggravated as Quinton shouts after him. 

“Don’t call me a fucking liar jus’ cause ye too pussy to go up against dah man, I’m fuckin’ telling you how it was, alrigh’?”

Markus breathes and rubs his face, then sticks his hands into his armpits to trap them down, keeps his gaze solidly away from their prisoner. He wants to hit him. He wants to feel the man’s skull cave against his fist, hear the raider scream agony, and Markus doesn’t think he’d feel the slightest bit guilty about making him. It’s terrifying. 

“He told us teh attack, and to leave no survivors. ‘Specially if they was kids, he said, specifically, to kill any an’ all children.”

“But why, why children specifically?” Daniel presses. 

“I dunno’, he just said that it was important, we needed ta get all of ‘em. An’ fuck, he was givin’ us a fuckton of money to do it, alrigh’? So he gives us a plan, said he’ll get us in—”

The same lie. The same undeniable _bullshit_. Markus whirls, hand waving away Quinton’s words. “Stop, just stop.”

“—And that you’d be gone, there’d be nobody, or barely anybody teh put up a fight, but he musta’ fuckin’ miscalculated or some shit. We had no idea you’d come burstin’ in like that for yer bitch—”

“I said stop!” Markus snarls and Daniel acts. His fist comes loud and heavy across Quinton’s face and Markus watches, tamping down a strange surge of jealousy as the strikes continue. What the Hell is wrong with him? He should be livid at himself, to be envious of torture. But thinking that this man could maybe be hurting more now than North did in that moment? 

That thought is intoxicating. 

Carl would surely be disappointed in him for it. 

That thought is sickening. 

He’s so distracted that Daniel pummels Quinton solidly until the impacts are wet and the grunts have become moans. Markus jolts and shouts, “Stop!” again, only this time he’s pulling Daniel off him. 

The left of Quinton’s face bulges, misshapen and ballooning like a purple thundercloud, pouring blood. “Shit,” Markus curses. They’ll need to stifle the bleeding soon or they’ll lose their prisoner. Which means they’re wasting supplies, what they didn’t want, in addition to time.

“Oh Jesus fuckin’ Christ, what’s it you people want from me?” Quinton sobs, “I’m tellin’ you fucks how’s it is.”

“Come off it, don’t you get what’s happening here Quinton?” Daniel barks, breathing hard. “We’re going to keep doing this, every day. We’re going to beat you, and starve you, and run you behind this cart unless you tell us the truth. And when we get where we’re going, it’s going to be worse.” Daniel huffs and leans against the cart, rubbing his gritty hand against his thigh. He sounds reasonable as he says, “But if you tell us what we need to know, right now, it’s all over.”

“I tell ye and you lemme go?” Quinton sneers, mocking. His eyes lock with Markus.

“You tell us and we kill you quickly,” Daniel corrects with an eye roll.

Shock registers in Quinton’s face as Markus frowns, but doesn’t correct Daniel. He’s not sure if there’s something to correct. They’d killed all the other raiders they found, with brute vengeance, back at Jericho. Quinton is alive because he’d managed to escape that damned room before Markus could finish him, and Nikolaos had suggested wringing information from him when they caught up to him in the desert. He doesn’t particularly want this man to live, but he wonders if there is something owed to Quinton now because he is being mutilated, that he’s trading pain for a chance at life. 

“Bring it, pussies.”

“Tasteful,” Daniel sighs. 

“Yer fuckin’ cocked. Fuckin’ crazy,” Quinton murmurs. His metallic arms glint in the sun as he lists on his knees, obviously exhausted. And Markus is too, so much that it makes him angrier than ever. 

“Patch him up, Daniel. I’m done.” He storms away. Not fast enough, however, for Quinton to resist one last jibe.

“I dun’ know whatcha did to piss the man off, but you gotta grow a lot more balls if yer gon’ be taking on the man that dun this boy. **Hank Anderson’s** gonna’ eat you live.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SPOILER: Hank is NOT responsible for the initial raid on JERICHO. This will be revealed as the plot develops but I wanted to be clear about Hank not being the instigator here. The Saint Bernard symbol is intended to be his symbol however!
> 
> **Nikolaos is intended to be the android that asks Kara for help, the android with the orange eyes (not sure if the model type was ever revealed?). His giant polar bear is also intended to be the URS12 android polar bear.
> 
> Echo and Ripple are the Tracis from the Eden Club, named by Amelia Dechart, in case you were unaware1 :)
> 
> Please leave a comment saying what you liked, disliked, and even suggestions! And remember that kudos are free <3


End file.
